Historians v revisionists, methodology.

[Nessie]

This is off topic, but it relates to the topic, as you are clearly trying to find excuses to doubt the gassing narrative. That there is an uncertain timeline and disagreement, causes you to think the whole thing is a hoax. Historians regard such uncertainty as just gaps in the evidence on a subject that spans years, a lot of people and locations. You would think that if historians were part of a hoax, they would agree on a narrative and stick to it.

It is not off topic. It is extremely relevant. Hoess says he visited BERLIN and met with Himmler in 1941 and that he received his orders there. THEN a year Himmler came to Auschwitz to observed gassings in the Bunkers.

I am pointing out to you why your 1942 timeline doesn't work and you have evaded the issues I have raised. Your replies have been very dishonest.

It is not dishonest of me to point out that either;

A - Hoess gave the wrong year, he made a mistake, he was under a lot of duress, or;

B - the order in 1941 was relating to prisoner euthanasia, part of Aktion 14f13, rather than the Final Solution specific to Jews.

In both cases, reasonable explanations are provided which evidence he did not lie. You claim, with no evidence, that if someone gets a timeline wrong, that proves they lied.

[Nessie]

That is why your methodology is flawed and the methodology use by historians is far more accurate.

You need to stop pretending like you speak for "historians." You don't.

I speak to the methodology they use to determine truthfulness and accuracy, as taught at university. Corroboration, the gathering of evidence to create a chronology leading to a proven conclusion. That is something revisionists cannot do.

Historians DO reject/discount statements due to errors. All the time. They do not follow your "all errors can be ignored" nonsense.

I do not claim that all errors can be ignored, you are creating a straw man. I have said, repeatedly, that parts of Hoess's testimony is regarded as inaccurate and I have given examples of witnesses who are largely rejected, such as Elie Wiesel.

Historians generally do NOT rely on psychological studies. They use something called source criticism. Psychological studies of memory etc are relatively recent.

Source criticism involves the checking of the source of evidence, it accuracy and reliability. Examples would be determining if a witnesses claims were hearsay or what they saw and where a document came from and if its authorship can be confirmed. Once the status of the evidence is determined, its truthfulness and accuracy is determined by corroboration. For example, the Hofle Telegram. Its source is known, it came from the British archives, found in 2000, and it is a radio intercept. Hofle is verified as a person who was on the staff of AR, so authorship is confirmed. It is then corroborated, in part, by the Korherr Report, which uses an identical figure. That the AR camps received mass transports running into hundreds of thousands of people is corroborated by ghetto transport records, the Ganzenmuller Letter and multiple eyewitnesses who worked at, or near the AR camps. Thus, it is now proven that Hofle was being truthful and accurate.

You are correct historians do not rely in psychological studies, but they rarely, if ever, conduct the witness interviews. Journalists, lawyers and the police are more knowledgeable about witnesses, memory, recall and their estimations, as they are experienced statement takers. Their collective knowledge, of how poor people can be, when describing what they saw, or were told, is why they are far more accepting of mistakes than revisionists are. The psychological studies prove that the journalists, lawyers and police are correct. If a witness claims something physically impossible, such as they visited a camp a year before it opened, that does not prove they lied, it is far more likely they made a mistake.

To prove if Hoess visited TII, requires corroborating evidence. Did someone who worked at the camp recollect the visit? Does a document record the visit? Does he provide details only someone who visited could know? If the answer is yes to any of the questions, then Hoess is corroborated, he did visit TII. If the answer is no, there is no corroboration, but that does not prove he lied. To do that you need evidence he lied, such as a camp official who is adamant Hoess never visited, or a document that records visitors and he is not named on it.

You do not show any signs of evidencing Hoess as lying. Instead, you are wholly reliant on claiming that because he got dates and timelines wrong, that proves he lied. You are wrong to do that, because, as I have shown, he could have been mistaken. You claim mistakes proves lies, with nothing to back up on that.

[Nessie]

Archie;

viewtopic.php?p=24175#p24175

A few more comments on this.
Most studies on witness memory etc are by psychologists. Most of this research is relatively recent. Traditionally, historians do not rely on such studies. Historians by and large assess sources using their own methods of source criticism. In law, witnesses are sworn and subjected to cross-examination. Generally no "studies" are relied upon. Occasionally, psychologists may be employed as expert witnesses.

The various witness interview courses and teaching I had in the police, did not rely on the studies of psychologists. We were taught how to differentiate between hearsay and eyewitness evidence and why that was important. We were taught the importance of corroboration in determining truthfulness and accuracy. We then learned about witness memory, recall and estimations on the job, as we interviewed witnesses. It soon became clear who were the credible and reliable witnesses, who were not and importantly, who was credible, but lying. Lawyers and historians also do not rely on the psychologists, as they have also learned through teaching and on the job, about hearsay, corroboration, truthfulness and credibility.

The reason why I introduced evidence from psychologists into the debate, was to prove my claims about memory, recall and estimation. Their studies explain why Hoess, Gerstein, Wiernik, Tauber etc say what said. Historians and lawyers do not produce studies of how well we remember and are we any good at estimating time, duration and size. Psychologists do.

Contrary to what Nessie says, revisionists have actually been very well aware of this sort of research and have been citing it since the 1980s.

I do not believe that claim and would like to see evidence of it happening.

And that's because it helps revisionists. If it's conceded that eyewitness testimony is far less reliable than commonly assumed, that erodes the evidentiary basis for the Holocaust.

Historians, lawyers and the police have known for a long time, going back before any studies, that witness evidence is the least reliable form of evidence, compared to documents, physical items, photos, forensics etc. It does not help revisionists to admit eyewitness testimony has issues, because those issues are evidence of poor memory and estimations, not lying. That is the part you do not get. Not being reliable, does not mean lying. If someone gives a very poor description of a gassing, that has claims which physically cannot have happened, that is not evidence they are not being truthful and no such gassing took place.

It is also worth noting that research studies in psychology specifically are not the most reliable. In the last decade or two there has been much attention on the so-called Replication Crisis in the social sciences, especially psychology. Basically most of the results in the papers fail to replicate when tested.

Tests that find people are poor at estimation dimensions and how large a crowd is, explain why so many eyewitnesses to the gas chmabers, gave dimensions and how many people fitted inside, that cannot be correct. The research matches what the eyewitnesses said.

[Monsieur Sceptique]

banned

Get over yourself, its a good job you’ve had multiple entire threads dedicated to the fallacies you dont understand and people can go laugh at how much you blew it in various places.

All you and the rest needed to do, was to explain why your disbelief about the physical possibility of gassings, based on the evidence from eyewitnesses and what little was left by the Nazis, is proof that there were no gas chambers.

You couldn't do that, so the subject is censored.

For God’s sake. Be thankful im not a mod here or else you actually would be banned at the IP level for the thousands of cumulative man-hours you have leeched from the users here.

You would rather ban me, than debate me over your methodology. That is evidence to prove how deeply flawed your methodology is. Your treatment of witness evidence, your failure to produce a revised history and your overconfident assessment of evidence you have no training or expertise in, are all flaws that you are unable to defend.

Did you know that historical criticism also applies to eyewitness accounts, and that documents are subject to both internal and external criticism? Of course, cross-referencing sources is important, but source criticism is just as important. It seems to me that I have seen many people here engaging in this kind of criticism. Example: criticism of the meaning of certain German words is an internal critique, just as examining the way the document is written is an external critique. I don’t really see how this differs from historical methodologies. And I’ve seen cross-referencing in your work as well as in that of others here.

[Nessie]

....
Did you know that historical criticism also applies to eyewitness accounts, and that documents are subject to both internal and external criticism? Of course, cross-referencing sources is important, but source criticism is just as important. It seems to me that I have seen many people here engaging in this kind of criticism. Example: criticism of the meaning of certain German words is an internal critique, just as examining the way the document is written is an external critique. I don’t really see how this differs from historical methodologies. And I’ve seen cross-referencing in your work as well as in that of others here.

The way revisionists critique documents is as poor as their critique of witnesses. For example, Mattogno on the use of the term "special" in relation to the Kremas at Birkenau. He finds documents that relate the use of other places that also refer to "special" and concludes, since those places had no homicidal purpose, that means neither did the Kremas. He ignores the evidence that the Kremas had gas chambers for homicidal purposes and that context proves "special" when related to Kremas, refers to gassing. The correct context is the Kremas, not other buildings.

Much of the criticism of documents, by revisionists, involves thinking up excuses to claim the document is somehow faked, the Stroop Report being a classic example. There is evidence to prove he was at Warsaw and his claims are corroborated. That is the type of cross referencing you see me do, a lot.

[Monsieur Sceptique]

....
Did you know that historical criticism also applies to eyewitness accounts, and that documents are subject to both internal and external criticism? Of course, cross-referencing sources is important, but source criticism is just as important. It seems to me that I have seen many people here engaging in this kind of criticism. Example: criticism of the meaning of certain German words is an internal critique, just as examining the way the document is written is an external critique. I don’t really see how this differs from historical methodologies. And I’ve seen cross-referencing in your work as well as in that of others here.

The way revisionists critique documents is as poor as their critique of witnesses. For example, Mattogno on the use of the term "special" in relation to the Kremas at Birkenau. He finds documents that relate the use of other places that also refer to "special" and concludes, since those places had no homicidal purpose, that means neither did the Kremas. He ignores the evidence that the Kremas had gas chambers for homicidal purposes and that context proves "special" when related to Kremas, refers to gassing. The correct context is the Kremas, not other buildings.

Much of the criticism of documents, by revisionists, involves thinking up excuses to claim the document is somehow faked, the Stroop Report being a classic example. There is evidence to prove he was at Warsaw and his claims are corroborated. That is the type of cross referencing you see me do, a lot.

This is an example of Mattogno cross-referencing sources; however, if Mattogno draws this conclusion, it is because he cross-references with other revisionist works in the same way that you cross-reference with historians. Take the case of the Dalton v Cockerill debate. Dalton does not deny that the report is true; he does, however, say that there is an explanation for the Jewish deaths other than extermination. Furthermore, he cross-references Goebbels’ diary; from a methodological point of view, it is the same methodology. Moreover, Deborah Lipstadt pointed out that revisionists, in particular, included footnotes. The fundamental difference lies in how they interpret the document and the conclusions they draw; that is primarily what distinguishes the two groups. And here I have seen both sides provide sources for their claims; I do not believe that either side is necessarily dishonest.

[Nessie]

....
This is an example of Mattogno cross-referencing sources; however, if Mattogno draws this conclusion, it is because he cross-references with other revisionist works in the same way that you cross-reference with historians. Take the case of the Dalton v Cockerill debate. Dalton does not deny that the report is true; he does, however, say that there is an explanation for the Jewish deaths other than extermination. Furthermore, he cross-references Goebbels’ diary; from a methodological point of view, it is the same methodology. Moreover, Deborah Lipstadt pointed out that revisionists, in particular, included footnotes. The fundamental difference lies in how they interpret the document and the conclusions they draw; that is primarily what distinguishes the two groups. And here I have seen both sides provide sources for their claims; I do not believe that either side is necessarily dishonest.

This is where historians win hands down. They are able to produce a chronology of events relating to the use of the Kremas, that comes to an evidenced conclusion. Mattogno et al, cannot do that. Indeed, Mattogno alone postulates on the Krema being used for delousing, as showers and corpse stores. Crowell argued for showers. Butz argued they were air raid shelters.

When it comes to the eyewitness evidence, as in Jews and SS camp staff who worked at the Kremas, they 100% support the historians and none support the various revisionist claims. That is why historians are correct to interpret a document that records the construction of gas chambers, or gassing cellars, inside the Kremas, as for homicidal purposes. That document does not support the Krema had a shower or it was a bomb shelter. It could support delousing chambers, but then there are revisionists, Leuchter and Rudolf, who claim that cannot be the case. The residues of HCN are far lower than that of the known delousing chambers, so the Kremas were surely were not used for delousing. That means revisionism is all over the place, contradicting itself, which is indicative of the conclusions it draws being wrong.